Technicolor’s facility in Bangkok, Thailand is to close at the end of the month.

Staff at the long-established plant have been told that their last day will be March 27 and that the facility will close on March 31.

The site had provided a full laboratory service and digital post-production facilities for customers in Southeast Asia.

It is not clear whether the digital post-production operations can be salvaged. In Thailand there has been talk of a local investor acquiring some or all of the digital businesses. The sound mixing unit is understood to be profitable.

The Bangkok plant had previously been a beneficiary of consolidation in the conventional film business. In 2011 it was announced that competitor Deluxe would subcontract release-print manufacturing to Technicolor Thailand (while Technicolor subcontracted print manufacturing to Deluxe in North America.)

But the continuing decline in demand for photochemical processing and release print manufacturing has finally led to the closure.

This was not unexpected at all. In fact the prevailing attitude was when would all come to fruition. WE all had out guess at when Hollywood, Montreal, Rome and Thailand would finally pull the plug.

But one just can’t help but wonder about the management’s overall goal. As a supervisor in the technical control operations for 16 years it sure did look like management just couldn’t wait to put Technicolor out of its misery made all the more difficult by its management.

Their were other alternative for the great Technicolor Inc but ( management) failed to get on that bus when they started bringing in people from industries who couldn’t tell a piece of exposed film from raw stock. The management just didn’t have the vision about the future of entertainment.

They were more concerned about how/why union IATSE members were making a good living for their families. Plain and simple, we IATSE 700 had the skill and knowhow to keep the work in-house but management couldn’t get the work in the door.

I had visited Technicolor Thailand many times in the past. The last time was in 2008 when Ming Lui and I had gone there for a week of troubleshooting. We attempted to get the laboratory back on track after an upheaval by many of the employees working there due to mismanagement by the lab manager at the time. This news is not unexpected as most film labs will be closing down. The only ones which will remain open will be the archival labs who so restoration and preservation.

The group of employees at the Technicolor Bangkok lab were extremely dedicated and hard working. It has been a rewarding pleasure to work with them over many years. It is very sad to see that come to an end. New technology always wins as it did with film for 100+ years. What will be the ‘new technology’ 100 years from now? I will probably not be around o see it but I’m sure it will be amazing.